LG BD 390 Network Blu-ray Disc Player Right now

The LG BD-390 is the most value/feature packed Blu-ray player out there. I would have gone for the Oppo BDP-83, but the $500 price tag and the lack of network video options basically made it a no-go. The LG supports Netflix Instant Watch, YouTube, Vudu (soon) and from what I hear, Pandora. It sees my Mac and FreeNAS based media sever just fine (not sure what problems others are having but I am admittedly much more computer and network savvy than the average user) and plays back other media types quite well.

The player looks beautiful playing back content on my Samsung 40" LCD HDTV (LN40A550) and 1080p combined with 7.1 surround sound is extremely awesome. As an upscaling player, the player does a solid job -- probably not as good as a stand-alone high-end DVD player, but it still looks great.

I really appreciate the audio options because I have an older Denon receiver (AVR-1905) that doesn't support HDMI, but is perfect in every other way. I hated having to look at spending another $350-$400 just to get one with HDMI support -- running the digital coax and analog outs to the receiver makes everything sound superb since all the processing is done on the player. Love it!

My only complaint -- and in retrospect this is minor -- is that the 802.11n support is pretty useless if you run your router on the 5Ghz spectrum. My Airport Extreme (the version before the current dual-band device) is at 5Ghz for our Macs but we have an older G-router connected to it to support older devices and our mobile devices, so that's what I'm stuck using with the LG. It's fast enough, but part of the reason I got the LG over a PS3 slim was the 802.11n. I might look at getting another N-router to run at 2.4GHz in mixed-mode to hook up to the Airport Extreme but right now, it isn't life or death. That's the only thing that keeps me from giving t his 5 stars.

The price dropped while this was on its way to me, so if you're looking at this player, you might want to either wait a few weeks to see if this goes to $250 or keep in mind that Amazon no longer does post-order price matching.

In any event, for under $300, this is a great player and a very workable media center of sorts.

**Update for Airport Extreme Owners**

I found that by putting the router in "N-only" on the 2.4Ghz spectrum, the device worked beautifully and the increased speed was much, much better. The downside is that I had to play with the channels on my older G-router for the non-N devices in our house, but that's one workaround for anyone wanting N-speed from their player to their router. In my house, it made all the difference in the world in regards to doing Netflix and whatnot.Get more detail about LG BD 390 Network Blu-ray Disc Player.